How will Airbnb’s Olympic / Paralympic legacy be defined? I spoke to Short Term Rentalz about our experience here in Japan. Currently the Tokyo 2020 Olympics are in full swing here after being postponed for a year due the Global Pandemic. The opening ceremony happened last week, here in Tokyo, on July 23rd. The Olympics and Paraolympics were going to be a huge event for us, and a huge win for our Short Term Rental Business, Tokyo Family Stays.
Paul (the author) touches on how Airbnb became a sponsor of the Olympics & Paralympics and the history there and how the Global Pandemic with Covid-19 has affected everyone worldwide, including our entire life here in Japan. He askes “But what will be Airbnb’s defining legacy once the flame goes out in 2021? Can it truly capture the exposure it wants without the presence of in-person spectators?”
Paul goes on to talk about the How will Airbnb’s Olympic / Paralympic legacy be defined and I was featured in the 2nd half of the article as someone “on the ground” here in Tokyo. Previously I wrote about our own experience with the pandemic here.
Excerpt from the article- Airbnb’s Olympic Legacy
How will the Games affect Japan’s short-term rental industry?
Sceptics of the Airbnb partnership saw it as a measure of cutting costs associated with hosting two major sporting events in the space of two years, but to Thomas Bach, the Games would provide guaranteed accommodation for visitors, families of athletes, and officials, reducing the need for host cities to invest significantly in new hotels.
For Tracey Northcott, a property manager and CEO of Tokyo Family Stays and Tracey Northcott Consulting, it made perfect sense for Airbnb to host the 2020 Games too. Even without the pandemic, there would have been a shortfall of 30,000 rooms to fulfil demand during the competitions, and discussions even took place to bring in cruise ships as floating hotels.
The majority of operators’ businesses, like Northcott’s, were “decimated” by the pandemic, triggered by border restrictions, the postponements of the Games, and cancellations of other in-demand occasions, such as the Tokyo Marathon and Hanami [Cherry Blossom Season].
Northcott said: “99 per cent of our guests were inbound tourists. The borders were closed to all non-Japanese [even those with a working visa] and of course not tourist visas have been issued.
“We had a number of listings that we were specifically keeping for the Olympics and when it was clear that they were to be postponed [or even cancelled], we made some hard decisions and closed these down. We now have about a third of our inventory that we had in January 2020.
“We had planned for the Olympics year for about five years. We were strategic in our choice of properties to be close to venues and suit our target customer of families. We were successful throughout 2019 in our marketing and were fully booked with mostly athletes’ families.
With officials, support staff and journalists all in lockdown bubbles and unable to mix with the general population, hosts are left counting the cost of empty Airbnb listings during the Games.
Northcott believes that Airbnb could have done more in terms of community outreach and support hosts, both when the new regulations went through in 2018 and at the start of the pandemic when it cancelled bookings that could no longer be fulfilled. The company’s reliance on international inbound tourism, as opposed to strengthening local communities based around domestic travel is leading to a drop in smaller hosts and listings, albeit a rise in ryokan licences for single dwellings [bookable all year].
“There is not the demand – this is not the fault of Airbnb or the hosts. This is just collateral damage of a global pandemic, which is a human and economic tragedy.
“I am sympathetic to Airbnb as they were going to be one of the heroes of the Games when the previous projections showed there wouldn’t be enough supply for the expected demand. Now they are in the same place as the hosts – left high and dry without much government sympathy or support,” added Northcott.
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